While living in the University dorms, meal plans are important and there are several different choices of plans.

There’s the plan that has only meals, the plan that is only cafe credits and the plan that is a combination of meals and credits.

Cafe credits can be used at late night locations or to swipe a friend who doesn’t have a meal plan into the dining hall. Late night, contrary to what every one calls it, is not open only at night. Basically, every dining hall has a late night where you go to get different items such as pizza, cartons of milk, smoothies, etc. They all have different options and different hours, so check the housing Web site and then experiment. For instance, Busey’s late night is only open at night Monday through Thursday and has some great desserts and sandwiches on croissants.

I’ve always had the combination of meals and credits. I don’t think I could have the plan with only meals because then you can only eat when the dining hall is open. I think the plan with only credits would be too hard to keep track of what you have used during the week.

I’ve always liked the combination plan, but it depends on how often you plan on getting things from late night and how often you think you will eat in the dining halls. And, remember that when you have a University meal plan you can eat or go to late night in any of the dorms, not just the one where you live.